i had finished IMWI in 11:49 and then IMCoz in 10:56 (first race was placid in 2011 which was 12:48) and i was pretty stoked about shaving an hour off each time. i signed up for coaching with QT2 systems and i knew it was going to be tough. i've never used coaching, i believed in my own plans and my own training routine but i trusted the suggestions of many friends and signed up. most people sign up for a 25-40 week plan for an ironman, i did a 12 week plan. i knew that's the most i could possibly follow someone else for. i opted to train and prepare on my own beforehand.
i would say the first 1.5 months of training went well. i was focused, didn't miss many workouts at all. but like all iron distance races (i'm going to shorthand and call them ironmans, because well, i think they should all be called ironmans) you really have to put it as a priority. training has always been a priority, mainly because i like to swim bike and run. but it's never a top priority. i had 3 bachelor parties and three weddings (one in jamaica, one in india and one the friday before the race) that were of close friends. wasn't going to miss those for anything. on top of that i had injured my shoulder and really couldn't swim more than 1600 yards without pain. i did what i could swimming right to my pain limit and calling it a day.
going into this race i wanted to break 10. in other words i wanted to shave another hour off my race time. about 2/3 of the way through training i knew it wasn't a reality. i had gotten sick in india and never felt perfect since returning. it is what it is. my goal was to stay under 12 hours (we had dinner reservations at 7:15pm, which i chose).
saturday morning i woke up at 6am, luckily not hungover. i had kept myself in check the night before, but apparently beer, scotch and then tequila shots don't sit too well with my body. oh well. i picked my buddy mike and we headed down with cole. i'll spare you details of the drive. it sucked, lots of traffic, getting lost in NYC but finally making our way to AC.
athlete check in was a BREEZE. nothing like IM checkins. props to their setup. the night was pretty simple. though walking around a smoke filled casino prior to racing was annoying. smoke irritates me, literally. but shit happens. had dinner with my aunt, uncle and 2 cousins. i never thought i would eat chinese food prior to a race, but man. it was a pretty awesome meal. not the best pre race food, but the calories were nice to store.
race morning i woke up at 3:30am and adopted my friend konstantins breakfast. no food, just juice. i purchased 25 dollars worth of naked juices and had 1. i went back to bed, woke up at 4:15 and had another. i carried another and banana with me downstairs. i was going to hail a taxi, but this guy nodded at me and we chatted about the race. him and his wife offered to drive me there as they were on their way. come to find out, his name was john as well. he had DNF'd his first attempt at 140.6 and he was looking for a flat race to give it a wing again. we talked about typical tri stuff and i literally said that if it was not wetsuit legal i would go home. i've been nursing a shoulder injury for about 2 months. i was able to swim 1650m a week before the race without pain so i decided i would give the race a go. literally as i stepped out of johns van i could hear over the intercom that the water temp was over 78 and it was non wetsuit legal. CAC gave the option of wearing your wetsuit but you would start on the final wave at 6:35.
i was bummed when i heard this. i wish i had brought my kiwami swim skin. i don't know what i was thinking. well, i wasn't. i was busy with work, wedding etc. it had been a hectic week. i literally threw stuff in my car and drove down. i switched back and forth between using the wetsuit or not but i let my ego get the best of me. i thought. if i'm going to do this i'm going to do it the right way. i've swum in 79 degree weather with a wetsuit before. it was HOT HOT HOT. my chest felt like it was burning up so with that i opted to go without the suit. there was a good 40 mins of sitting, waiting for the sun to rise and being mentally prepared to endure the long day. as i got into the chute to get in the water i bumped into a fellow qt2 guy who was from boston. nice guy, i think his name was dave. he, like myself thought about the wetsuit. i guess we couldn't bare the embarrassment of the last wave and having everyone see us, haha.
the swim:
i got into the water and the first thing i thought was "no way in hell is this water over 78". the floor was muddy, like if you were going clamming muddy. the water is PITCH black. but oh well i thought to myself, time to start the race. the gun went off and there we went. i felt pretty good, i stayed to the right to avoid much contact and things were pretty smooth to the first buoy. from there it was a 90 deg turn which was perfectly fine, not crowded at all. we turned 90 deg again and headed back to the start. by then the sun was up a decent amount, it was really hard to spot the buoys as the sun was blinding me. i knew this was a problem so i opted with my black mirrored goggles but they were not too much help. i relied on following others. about 1/3 of the way into the swim we swam through a marshy section. i knew the area would be slightly shallow, but i didn't think it was THAT shallow. as i pulled with my R arm something sharp hit my pinky. it hurt so i immediately stopped swimming. when i did this i was able to stand up, i looked at my finger and it was cut open. not bad, just enough to bleed and worry me slightly. luckily i was in india just 2-3 weeks prior to the race and had a booster tetanus shot. from there i cleared my goggles and took few steps forward to move out of the way as another athlete was swimming right at me. BOOM. i stepped on something sharp and it had cut my great toe. i pull my foot up and i see that my toe is cut open, the long way about a 3/4 inch cut. there was nothing i could do and i thought the best option was to carry on with the swim. so that's what i did.
race morning i woke up at 3:30am and adopted my friend konstantins breakfast. no food, just juice. i purchased 25 dollars worth of naked juices and had 1. i went back to bed, woke up at 4:15 and had another. i carried another and banana with me downstairs. i was going to hail a taxi, but this guy nodded at me and we chatted about the race. him and his wife offered to drive me there as they were on their way. come to find out, his name was john as well. he had DNF'd his first attempt at 140.6 and he was looking for a flat race to give it a wing again. we talked about typical tri stuff and i literally said that if it was not wetsuit legal i would go home. i've been nursing a shoulder injury for about 2 months. i was able to swim 1650m a week before the race without pain so i decided i would give the race a go. literally as i stepped out of johns van i could hear over the intercom that the water temp was over 78 and it was non wetsuit legal. CAC gave the option of wearing your wetsuit but you would start on the final wave at 6:35.
i was bummed when i heard this. i wish i had brought my kiwami swim skin. i don't know what i was thinking. well, i wasn't. i was busy with work, wedding etc. it had been a hectic week. i literally threw stuff in my car and drove down. i switched back and forth between using the wetsuit or not but i let my ego get the best of me. i thought. if i'm going to do this i'm going to do it the right way. i've swum in 79 degree weather with a wetsuit before. it was HOT HOT HOT. my chest felt like it was burning up so with that i opted to go without the suit. there was a good 40 mins of sitting, waiting for the sun to rise and being mentally prepared to endure the long day. as i got into the chute to get in the water i bumped into a fellow qt2 guy who was from boston. nice guy, i think his name was dave. he, like myself thought about the wetsuit. i guess we couldn't bare the embarrassment of the last wave and having everyone see us, haha.
the swim:
i got into the water and the first thing i thought was "no way in hell is this water over 78". the floor was muddy, like if you were going clamming muddy. the water is PITCH black. but oh well i thought to myself, time to start the race. the gun went off and there we went. i felt pretty good, i stayed to the right to avoid much contact and things were pretty smooth to the first buoy. from there it was a 90 deg turn which was perfectly fine, not crowded at all. we turned 90 deg again and headed back to the start. by then the sun was up a decent amount, it was really hard to spot the buoys as the sun was blinding me. i knew this was a problem so i opted with my black mirrored goggles but they were not too much help. i relied on following others. about 1/3 of the way into the swim we swam through a marshy section. i knew the area would be slightly shallow, but i didn't think it was THAT shallow. as i pulled with my R arm something sharp hit my pinky. it hurt so i immediately stopped swimming. when i did this i was able to stand up, i looked at my finger and it was cut open. not bad, just enough to bleed and worry me slightly. luckily i was in india just 2-3 weeks prior to the race and had a booster tetanus shot. from there i cleared my goggles and took few steps forward to move out of the way as another athlete was swimming right at me. BOOM. i stepped on something sharp and it had cut my great toe. i pull my foot up and i see that my toe is cut open, the long way about a 3/4 inch cut. there was nothing i could do and i thought the best option was to carry on with the swim. so that's what i did.
at this point i started to question everything. the thoughts of failing ran through my head over and over again. you didn't train enough for the swim, your L shoulder is injured, your right pinky stings in the salt, your great toe stings with every kick and there were not nearly the amount of support staff there is on a WTC race. i've seen more support in a half iron WTC than during this race. then i hit my stride. i said shut up and move along. after a few minutes i noticed about 50 or so swimmers swimming towards an orange buoy, which i remembered was the center buoy (part of the Y course). i stopped and looked right and saw swimmers going in two different directions. i adjusted course and rounded the course properly. i noticed there was a current, but i didn't notice how strong it was. for all i know i was slow because i was injured and under trained and not wearing a wetsuit. after rounding the orange buoy i again had no idea where i was going. i just looked for people as there were a few buoys pretty far away and i wasn't exactly sure which one was the one to go to. i rounded the left part of the Y on the course and worked my way back. i had a little bit of trouble figuring out where the exit was in the water, i asked the guy on the board and he said the red buoys. he was wrong. it happens. i got out of the water without help and the first thing i noticed was that it hurt to step on my toe. oh well, ironmans hurt. i ran towards the chute and my buddy mike yells at me. he always finds me at races (except that one time at timberman, where everyone lost me) and got some good photos of me i think. i then heard my aunt and cousins yell for me. i figured i swam a 2+ hour swim (i honestly thought 2:20) so i ran back i high fived them and chatted a bit. rinsed off and headed towards T1.
bike course:
getting my bike was a cinch and i was off. the bike course felt fast. riding on the turnpike was nice. i was really exciting to finish the bike as i thought it was going to be an insanely fast course. now i know why people love IMFL. everything was great, you could tell there were a few clear IM/triathlon noobs. lots of folks were not dropping back properly after being passed which made things a bit annoying. i did the work to pass you, i shouldn't have to go even faster to finish the pass, once my wheel crosses you slow down, i shouldn't have to add more speed when my current speed is already faster than yours. but whatever, that's racing. everything was going well. i had my nutrition dialed in perfect. i was taking in awesome food (raisins and dehydrated bananas ftw!). i got a bit confused about special needs so i stopped the first loop around. i wish i didn't. i wasted a good 5 minutes there. i loaded up on food and took off. unfortunately i reloaded poorly and didn't put any gu/powergel in my rear container which contained the raisins and salt tabs. as i rode i lost most of the food from a few big bumps. luckily i had about 8-900 more calories in my jersey pockets and another 3-4 gu's in the front compartment.
things were going well. i was still averaging in the 21's by the time i hit mile 70. but that's when things fell apart. i had forgotten my race belt so i purchased a TYR belt. it was thicker and sat nigher, as a result it blocked the bottom 1/3 of my tri top pockets. i didn't realized this and since the food was not all the way in i ejected most of it between mile 70-75. by the time i realized, it was too late. i had 3 gu's left for 42 miles. i had 2 water stations but i wasn't able to grab a banana because one of the girls was socializing (happens, they are kids, no big deal) and i didn't get a gatorade for the same reason (again, it happens, i'm glad they are there to help. i could have stopped and grabbed one, not their fault). by the time mile. 90 hit i was starting to hurt on the bike. i did what i could with what i had and the turnpike was brutal for me. i probably averaged 14mph the whole way and was passing people. had i not lost my nutrition i was pretty confident that i would have had my best ironman bike split.
things were going well. i was still averaging in the 21's by the time i hit mile 70. but that's when things fell apart. i had forgotten my race belt so i purchased a TYR belt. it was thicker and sat nigher, as a result it blocked the bottom 1/3 of my tri top pockets. i didn't realized this and since the food was not all the way in i ejected most of it between mile 70-75. by the time i realized, it was too late. i had 3 gu's left for 42 miles. i had 2 water stations but i wasn't able to grab a banana because one of the girls was socializing (happens, they are kids, no big deal) and i didn't get a gatorade for the same reason (again, it happens, i'm glad they are there to help. i could have stopped and grabbed one, not their fault). by the time mile. 90 hit i was starting to hurt on the bike. i did what i could with what i had and the turnpike was brutal for me. i probably averaged 14mph the whole way and was passing people. had i not lost my nutrition i was pretty confident that i would have had my best ironman bike split.
the last 30 miles was rough for me. it reminded me of cozumel 5 months ago. brutal winds. but with cozumel i had the run fitness to back it up. mentally i just checked out. i thought ok, i'm going to do a 5 hour marathon. do i want to put my body through that? what do i get for it? stroke my ego, get a medal, not get my first DNF. then i thought about the risk of injury and i decided to call it a day.
t2: going into t2 i knew i was done. i got some water, gatorade and took my final salt tablet.
run:
i knew i was done and thought i would at least run until i saw my friends. the run was uneventful, after an 8:30 first mile i slowed down to do a 9 min mile. some girl came up to me and started chatting me up. i picked up the pace with her and we did about 8:15 for 3 miles. i felt pretty good but i knew eventually i was going to bonk. at this time i was thinking my friends were definitely on the other side of the course. i knew i was close to the turn around but decided to just call it. my toe was hurting with every step, my body was shutting down i just knew it was time. i turned around and just started walking back.
i felt defeated, annoyed, hot and just tired. walking is stupid. i hate it and i didn't do any of it my last 2 ironmans. it is what it is. about a mile away from the aid station (i missed the one at the turn around because i didn't go that far) i started to feel very weak. i knew i was really low on sugar and started to have cold sweats. luckily i made it to the station, refueled and kept walking. about a mile away from the finish line i saw my friends. june and elliot were screaming my name. i remember looking at them and thinking. hmm, people call me by those names. but i have no idea who those folks are. it wasn't until elliot got really close did i recognize him and then june. seeing them was pretty awesome. i immediately felt energized, but i knew it was just an emotional high. we exchanged words and we all walked towards the finish. next i saw my aunt and uncle. she was so cute, she was screaming C'mon John! and telling me she would run with me. lol. i told her that i was done and we found mike, sarah and my 2 cousins. we stopped, chatted took some photos and i sent my family home (i didn't they would stay in AC that long, very sweet of them).
as we walked towards the finish line i couldn't help but notice how many people were in the way of the runners. if you were running anywhere near a sub 9 people were in your way. there is no way in hell you can comfortably run a sub 9 pace with that many people randomly crossing the boardwalk. very interesting/cool run. but def have a good swim and bike if you want to avoid people. i had never DNF'ed before so i wasn't really sure how to do it. i figured if i just walked across the line and told them i was dropping out that would work. as i walk towards the line the announcer was getting excited, people were clapping. they were all expecting me to be excited and run. i did not. i just walked. he kept asking are you done, are you done. i told him yeah, i'm done, i gestured slitting my throat. he then announces "oh, he's done" over the speakerphone. probably not the best thing to do buddy. i'm not hurt, i don't care. but i feel terrible for anyone else you did that to.
after DNF'ing i went to grab my bag, get changed then i went back inside to grab some food. i talked to a guy who did decently well and he and a few others were complaining about the current. i can never tell with traithletes if they are serious. are they just saying the current was rough to make themselves feel more badass? idk. i just had a shit day, not sure if it was the current or what. i am a shitty swimmer however. i was hoping to get some good food as i was zonked. but the food was terrible. i looked at it over and over and over and didn't want to eat any of it. i grabbed the fruit salad and 2 bags of utz chips. the food really was TERRIBLE. no one wants that stuff post ironman.
afterwards, i headed back to the hotel, got showered and went out to dinner with my friends. it was the best part of my day. we had amazing food (thank you sarah for the restaurant choice!) some good drinks and mike and i finished the night just chilling in the hotel and resting up for the long drive back.
i went into this race thinking i would give it my all and get great results. i learned a valuable lesson. commitment (more than 10 weeks) are required to do well in an iroman. i also have a newly found confidence in my swim and i now understand what it is like to "lose your nutriton" and the feeling of a DNF. most important, i learned a lot about myself. i didn't let my ego get the best of me, i didn't let what i thought others would think of me to dictate my actions and i am extremely happy with what i had done and will return one day (if they fix a few things) to finish the race i started.
thank you to my incredible auntie yung, her husband uncle kenny, my two amazing cousins, tiffany and emily for making the trip down. it's always awesome having family there. i hope i was able to set a good example to the kid cousins. thank you mike for your constant support. always the first to help my carry my gear to the course, pick up my bike while i'm racing and telling me how it is (calling me out for quitting could have waited a day or two though). thank you june, elliot and sarah for making the (short! ha ha) trip from phili. well, actually. thank you elliot for coming and driving the girls with you. the truth is, sarah and june came for the dinner, i'm not stupid. i've known you two for too long. thank you to my amazing roommate julia who helps care for my boy brewster so i can do all the things that i do. you have no idea how much you do for me and i don't think i could ever repay that. thank you chad for helping julia out, thank you olga for helping julia out, thank you trish for helping out where you were able to. lastly, thank you to my girlfriend yvonne. it's been a difficult start to our relationship, lots of late night get togethers (wink wink, hint hint. oh ok, lets be real, i'm usually too sleepy after a long workout), lots of getting woken up early because i need to pack my gear, lots of waiting until nighttime to do stuff, lots of me smelling like chlorine, and sweat, and dried up gu and eating overly healthy shit and all the other jazz that come with training. no one should have to live through dating a triathlete (even one that trains as little as i do), but i guess we survived, barely. the triathlon bug just doesn't go away. it's not a sport, it's a way of life. one that pushes you to challenge the way you do everything. one that makes you a better person in every way.
after DNF'ing i went to grab my bag, get changed then i went back inside to grab some food. i talked to a guy who did decently well and he and a few others were complaining about the current. i can never tell with traithletes if they are serious. are they just saying the current was rough to make themselves feel more badass? idk. i just had a shit day, not sure if it was the current or what. i am a shitty swimmer however. i was hoping to get some good food as i was zonked. but the food was terrible. i looked at it over and over and over and didn't want to eat any of it. i grabbed the fruit salad and 2 bags of utz chips. the food really was TERRIBLE. no one wants that stuff post ironman.
afterwards, i headed back to the hotel, got showered and went out to dinner with my friends. it was the best part of my day. we had amazing food (thank you sarah for the restaurant choice!) some good drinks and mike and i finished the night just chilling in the hotel and resting up for the long drive back.
i went into this race thinking i would give it my all and get great results. i learned a valuable lesson. commitment (more than 10 weeks) are required to do well in an iroman. i also have a newly found confidence in my swim and i now understand what it is like to "lose your nutriton" and the feeling of a DNF. most important, i learned a lot about myself. i didn't let my ego get the best of me, i didn't let what i thought others would think of me to dictate my actions and i am extremely happy with what i had done and will return one day (if they fix a few things) to finish the race i started.
thank you to my incredible auntie yung, her husband uncle kenny, my two amazing cousins, tiffany and emily for making the trip down. it's always awesome having family there. i hope i was able to set a good example to the kid cousins. thank you mike for your constant support. always the first to help my carry my gear to the course, pick up my bike while i'm racing and telling me how it is (calling me out for quitting could have waited a day or two though). thank you june, elliot and sarah for making the (short! ha ha) trip from phili. well, actually. thank you elliot for coming and driving the girls with you. the truth is, sarah and june came for the dinner, i'm not stupid. i've known you two for too long. thank you to my amazing roommate julia who helps care for my boy brewster so i can do all the things that i do. you have no idea how much you do for me and i don't think i could ever repay that. thank you chad for helping julia out, thank you olga for helping julia out, thank you trish for helping out where you were able to. lastly, thank you to my girlfriend yvonne. it's been a difficult start to our relationship, lots of late night get togethers (wink wink, hint hint. oh ok, lets be real, i'm usually too sleepy after a long workout), lots of getting woken up early because i need to pack my gear, lots of waiting until nighttime to do stuff, lots of me smelling like chlorine, and sweat, and dried up gu and eating overly healthy shit and all the other jazz that come with training. no one should have to live through dating a triathlete (even one that trains as little as i do), but i guess we survived, barely. the triathlon bug just doesn't go away. it's not a sport, it's a way of life. one that pushes you to challenge the way you do everything. one that makes you a better person in every way.
